This March, the Tucson-based human rights group Coalicion de Derechos Humanos announced that the number of recovered remains on the Arizona-Sonora border since October 1, 2009 had reached 85, a 60 percent increase from last year. And this does not accurately reflect the total extent of the crisis, as numbers of recovered remains in neighboring states are not available. But the increasing numbers are indicative of a failed policy.
Kat Rodriguez is the Coordinator of Derechos Humanos. "We also continue to see the tragic trend of the recovery of remains of unknown gender, which make up about 24.7 percent of the numbers this year," she wrote in a March press release about the dramatic increase in the number of recovered remains. "This means that approximately one in four individuals recovered are of unknown gender, making identification all the more difficult."
Her group maintains a list of recovered remains in an effort to assist family members to identify their loved ones.
Kee drove us up a dirt road. We parked, and each put on a backpack filled with water, extra clothing, and snacks. He had a GPS and first aid pack, as well as extra water, in case we crossed paths with some migrants.
"Sometimes we come out and set jugs of water along their trails," he explained. "Often when BP find them, they are confiscated or knifed. Not always, but this happens, along with the fact that we've had two Samaritans arrested and tried for putting out water."
There are also numerous stories of the BP providing life-saving medical aid to stranded migrants, and their efforts to save the lives of groups that have been abandoned by their less-than-trustworthy guides (coyotes).
As we hike up a well-used trail, there are, periodically, empty water bottles and water jugs strewn along the way. It's an ongoing cat and mouse game - as coyotes are paid large sums of money (by immigrant standards) to lead teams ranging from 3 to 30 migrants into the US across treacherous terrain.
Immigrants must trek across 20 to 60 miles of open desert, depending on where they get picked up on the US side. Then, if they are lucky enough not to be abandoned by their coyote, they are often loaded into a truck or van that takes them to an apartment, from which they find a way to a job, or relative who may be awaiting their arrival.But things often go wrong. Minutemen sometimes take shots at migrants. There are stories of BP pushing migrants into cactus before taking them into custody (BP tend to call migrants "tonks" because that is the sound their flashlights make when they strike the skull of a migrant), and coyotes sometimes rape their female clients, in addition to the aforementioned deaths.
"We find folks with blisters you would not believe, ankle injuries, extremely dehydrated and hungry," Kee explained as we hiked along the rugged trail, "Nobody should die out here. We're simply trying to prevent that from happening."
We come upon on old adobe house that has long since been abandoned. It's filled with burned mattresses, garbage, bullet casings, and empty beer cans. "I've never found a migrant carrying beer," Kee said with a smirk.
Further along the trail there are more empty water jugs, and old empty bottles of electrolyte drinks. Kee continued talking to me.
"If there was a poor family in Kentucky, and the father ventured to California to find a job to support them, he'd be a hero," Kee explained, "What's the difference here? Only that somebody drew a line in the sand."
Any report on the immigration issue would be remiss if it failed to mention NAFTA as the root cause. Locals in Mexico and other countries in Central America struggle to earn a living due to neoliberal economic policies that undercut their ability to do so - hence, turning them into economic refugees who then look north for salvation.
Our hike failed to produce an encounter with any migrants, so Kee took me to a camp maintained by the group No More Deaths near the small town of Ruby. The group, whose slogan is "Humanitarian aid is never a crime," maintains an ongoing humanitarian presence in this desert migration corridor south of Tucson. They do so by keeping a fixed base camp and intermittent mobile camps, and concentrate on upholding "the most fundamental human right - life itself - by providing basic humanitarian assistance to those in need."
No More Deaths also works in Mexico by maintaining aid centers for deported immigrants in border towns of the Sonora, where they provide medical care, recovery of confiscated belongings, and work to document human rights violations. Their volunteers are "committed to bearing public witness to the injustices taking place on the border" and in 2008 published a detailed report, "Crossing the Line: Human Rights Abuses of Migrants in Short-Term Custody on the Arizona/Sonora Border."
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